


The Heart More Dense and Green

by voleuse



Category: The Age of Adaline (2015)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-22
Updated: 2018-12-22
Packaged: 2019-09-24 15:21:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17103089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voleuse/pseuds/voleuse
Summary: What I recall equals all I feel, and I remember all the words.Immortality is contagious, in a way.





	The Heart More Dense and Green

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Karios](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Karios/gifts).



> Set before the movie’s main narrative takes place.

i. _I can presume you safe somewhere.  
I know the night lives inside you_

Perhaps because her memories of her father had faded into a series of sepia-toned photographs, Flemming’s perceptions of her mother as she grew up were hyper-saturated and sharp. As a child, she modeled her every movement on her mother’s bearing, and strove to make every gesture just as graceful. Every moment of Flemming’s life was limned with candle-flame, enduring but flickering all the same.

In her teens, Flemming’s adoration of her mother grew more complex, tinted with the typical rebellions and insecurities of young women at that age. It was almost impossible, she found, to gain anyone’s attention if Adaline Bowman entered the room; Flemming felt herself an awkward brown bird next to her mother’s glamour.

One night, Flemming was putting curlers into her hair when her mother came in and stood behind her. “That looks lovely,” she said to Flemming, and frowned when Flemming snorted in response.

“I love you, Mom,” Flemming said, “but honestly, that feels kind of hard to believe.”

Adaline looped her arms around Flemming’s shoulders for a quick hug before taking charge of the curlers. “I suppose I could be biased,” she admitted. “But young Bobby Granville certainly seems to agree.”

“Mom!” Flemming said, watching her cheeks flush in the mirror. “How did you--”

“Perhaps I ran into his mother at the grocer’s,” Adaline said, “and perhaps she wasn’t very subtle in asking if you had already found an escort to the winter formal.”

Flemming spun around, only wincing a bit as her hair snagged in the curler her mother was holding. “She didn’t! Really?”

Adaline opened her mouth to speak, but the phone rang a shrill interruption. “I suspect that call is for you,” she said, and she laughed as Flemming sprinted out to answer it.

 

ii. _you were loved with all I had, recklessly,  
and with abandon_

Flemming was never quite sure how to explain to her roommates why the FBI made periodic visits to their apartment. The government agents were always polite, and discreet as possible, given the givens, but past two visits (Flemming first pretended she had been a witness to the world’s least publicized bank robbery), things started to look suspicious.

One afternoon, Caroline overheard them asking about Adaline’s last known whereabouts, and from there, things sort of took a life of their own. The most common retelling had it that Flemming’s terribly sophisticated mother had, in a whirlwind romance, been duped by an international jewel thief--or sometimes a Renaissance art forger, when Flemming felt like mixing things up a bit--into burgling the summer residence of Viscount Something-or-Other, and was now, poor thing, on the lam.

This also, conveniently, explained why Flemming was always at loose ends when the holidays rolled around.

On what would have been her father’s birthday, Flemming went down to the pay phone by the corner store and placed a call to the reference desk at the central branch of the Denver Public Library. Someone picked up after two rings.

“Hello, Clarence,” Flemming said, recognizing the voice. “Would Marjorie happen to be around this afternoon?”

“Is that Miss Flemming?” Clarence said, his voice hoarse, probably from his latest cigarette break. “She just returned from lunch, in fact. Let me call her over.”

There was a muffled click, a few faint mutters, and then Adaline’s voice flooded the line. “Flemming, dear,” she said. “Have you quite recovered from that cold?”

“Yes, Mom,” Flemming replied. “I am capable of surviving a few days of coughing, you know.”

Adaline’s sigh was only a tad exaggerated. “It’s a mother’s prerogative to worry.”

“And I was wondering,” Flemming pushed on, “since it’s been a couple of years now, were you thinking about--”

“Yes,” Adaline said, then cleared her throat. “You remember your cousin Serena? In Manhattan? She’ll be working the catalogue at the Met, starting in April.”

“April,” Flemming said, doing some quick calculations in her head. “Maybe I’ll fly out and visit her, after school gets out.”

“I’m sure she’d love that,” Adaline replied. “I’m sure she can hardly wait.”

 

iii. _my garden near-inverts itself, splayed  
to catch each last ray of sun_

The hardest part of marrying Roger Prescott, Flemming found, was having to pretend through their entire courtship that her mother had languished in Europe for several years before succumbing to, of all things, a heart murmur. (Adaline had suggested consumption, and Flemming was resolved to tease her about that bit of old-fashioned phrasing until the next century rolled around.) 

The hardest part of the wedding was that, since Great Aunt Delia was attending, Adaline could only sneak into the back of the chapel after the ceremony had started. 

But six years later, and exactly two days after Roger had packed his things up and departed, Adaline arrived at Flemming’s door with a small overnight bag and a bottle of wine. Flemming had thought she was empty of tears, but once Adaline opened her arms, a sob escaped from Flemming’s throat, and she crumpled into her mother’s arms.

After a while, they settled on the sofa, Flemming resting her head in Adaline’s lap as she hadn’t done since she was a child.

“The worst part,” Flemming said, feeling a sting as she confessed, “is that part of me is relieved I don’t have to hide you anymore.”

Adaline stroked Flemming’s hair, and because Flemming had closed her eyes, she didn’t see that her mother was crying, too.

 

iv. _I finally figured out Pandora,  
and after all those years of silence_

This was what kept Flemming young, she thought most of the time, the sense that there was a spring at the very heart of her universe, a vitalizing force that enlivened her even as the years waned on. 

And Flemming aged, and Adaline didn’t. But though their roles in public shifted and reversed themselves, their hearts remained the same: Adaline Bowman, ever-poised and glamorous, and Flemming, living every day like a flame.

**Author's Note:**

> Title, summary, and headings adapted from Rebecca Foust’s "[Abeyance](https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/abeyance)."


End file.
